Another mini-meltdown

Well, today started off fairly smoothly. I had a PT appointment in the afternoon and I was almost ready to go when I heard screaming from the family room. It was Hannah yelling something and Shauna screaming, "Stop, you're hurting me! Owww! Hannah, stoooooop!", over and over again. Since I can't move quickly, there wasn't a whole lot I could do. Then Shauna managed to break away and came running in my room, screaming in pain. It turned out that Hannah had somehow found a perfume that they both thought belonged to them. Shauna told Hannah that she couldn't use it and Hannah said she could and she grabbed Shauna's hand around the finger area and was squeezing as hard as she could. Shauna must have told her to stop at least 10 times and made it very clear that Hannah was hurting her. Hannah finally came in my room after I called her three times on the phone and she kept hanging up on me. I asked each one what had happened and both girls had the same story. Hannah, however, felt that she was justified in what she did because Shauna pinched her. I asked her why Shauna pinched her and she said, "Because I was squeezing her hand and she wanted me to stop." So I said, "Well, if you were hurting her and she was trying to get you to stop, that is called self defense and that is allowed." I explained several times, but Hannah just couldn't "get it". She was convinced that she was in the right. I told her that she was going to get a consequence for the physical violence and she yelled "Whatever" as she headed toward my bedroom door to leave. Of course, she couldn't leave it at that and she was furious with me, so she grabbed an expensive, handmade porcelain doll that I had on my dresser and she threw it across the room at me. It missed me, but hit the wood on the side of my bed frame and broke the face. I was heartbroken because I absolutely love that doll.

I remember the day I got the doll in September of 1997. I was at a local craft fair with my friend, Debbie and I had Hannah in the stroller. We came upon a booth of handcrafted porcelain dolls.
They were beautiful and extremely well done. There was an African American baby girl doll, sucking her thumb that looked so much like Hannah that I had to have it. The price was really high, I think close to $200 and I really have never spent that much money on anything like that in my life, but it looked so much like Hannah that I couldn't resist. I ended up putting it on layaway and paying it off over a few months. I truly loved that doll because to me it represented the incredible love that I had for my first daughter.

I am going to talk to Hannah alone tonight and let her know just how much what she did hurt me. I don't want to make her feel bad, but she needs to realize that when she doesn't control herself, it can really physically or emotionally hurt someone. I know she will understand me, but when she gets into one of her rages, all of the little bit of logic that she actually has retained, goes straight out the window.

Well, that went well. As I was finishing up that last sentence, she came in my room and I told her I wanted to talk about the doll. She ran for the door and I told her to get back in here and she screamed, "No, it will just make me mad, I'm not talking about it". I guess I will have to wait until tomorrow to try again, but she WILL talk about it, whether she wants to or not.